


ocean breathes salty

by feverbeats



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-12
Updated: 2013-09-12
Packaged: 2017-12-26 09:28:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/964329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feverbeats/pseuds/feverbeats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They're the same kind of freak and Newt doesn't ask about Hermann's leg anymore and no one else can check Hermann's math and no one else truly thinks Newt is as smart as he claims.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ocean breathes salty

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [robokittens](http://robokittens.tumblr.com) for looking this over and telling me it wasn't terrible! The Vanessa headcanon here comes from [this art](http://obscenelybefuddled.tumblr.com/post/59678828674/so-i-reeeeeeeeally-wanted-to-draw-my-headcanon) by [obscenelybefuddled](http://obscenelybefuddled.tumblr.com/) on tumblr. Title from Modest Mouse. Some book canon, some made up shit. Warning: This will be my most socially acceptable Pacific Rim fic.

Newt always kind of figured he'd die alone.

Berlin, Philly, Chicago, Boston, Alaska, he never really gets along with people anywhere. He just talks and talks and talks until he realizes everyone's gotten bored and gone away. Or until he gets shoved in a locker. Okay, that doesn't happen after Philly.

To be fair, it's probably partly that he's really obnoxious. Or so he's been told. He knows he's smarter than everyone around him, and he isn't really sure how--not to be. How to turn it off. Turn it down. That's it, he can't turn anything down. Even medicated, he can't. Not all the way.

So it's great when he gets a job where he's paid to be smart and nobody really cares how obnoxious he is, because they're military and they assume all scientists are eccentric. Even Stacker Pentecost, who's smarter than he seems, is pretty dismissive. Which is great! When people are dismissing you, they're not calling you weird or breaking up with you or shoving you in a locker.

Three weeks after Newt is brought onto the project, they hire him a--partner? He wouldn't have picked that word, at the time. Pentecost strides into the lab and announces that they've hired someone else to "supplement and complement" Newt's skillset. Offensive.

"Doctor Hermann Gottlieb, meet Doctor Newton Giezler. You'll be working together heading up the team here for the remainder of the time we're stationed. Get to know one another, please."

Newt sticks his hand out and says, "Call me Newt!"

Gottlieb, a tense, vicious-looking man, doesn't take his hand. "I don't--Thank you, I don't _shake_. Pentecost has been telling me about your work. It had better be less improbable than it sounds."

Newt's feelings are incredibly hurt, but he doesn't say so. At least there's finally someone around who's more socially awkward than he is.

When he meets Hermann Gottlieb, they hate each other. For about a week! Then Newt realizes that Hermann is as smart as he is and _holy shit that is exciting_. He's not sure Hermann stops hating him, though.

Everyone gets close fast these days. Fast or not at all. With the world ending, what else do you do, really? Hermann screams at Newt about how he's disgusting, Newt makes fun of Hermann's accent, then they get their minds tangled together working out a theory that _wouldn't work_ with just one of them.

Newt has heard all of it. You know, all the stuff that made him call pilots codepedent (true!) and freaky. You get bits of other people's feelings and memories stuck in your head, mixed in with your own. You drift with the same person too much, you can sometimes feel the drift even when you're not connected to a jaeger. He's _heard_ it gives you a more intimate emotional connection and also makes you better at sex.

Thing is, he doesn't need to drift to have that kind of connection.

They're in sync with each other because they're out of sync with the rest of the world. Newt goes nights without sleeping, lights up electric and violent at nothing, can't slow his mouth down. Hermann can't run and hates stairs and hey, turns out everything that won't go fast enough in his body goes too fast in his brain. Just like Newt.

"So, do you have a diagnosis, or what?" Newt blurts. He's halfway through a pouch of tang and a sausage sandwich in the lab one morning. Hermann, as usual, has neglected to eat.

Hermann goes still. "How dare you?"

"What?" Newt says, dismayed. "I don't mean why are you weird. I mean, check it out, we probably have some of the same stuff, wonder how much we have in common. But that was rude." He's been told. "Sorry."

"Hm!" Hermann says. "Despite multiple attempts by my parents to pin one of several labels on me, the only thing I take _pills_ for is this." He jabs the ground viciously with his cane.

"What happened, anyway?" Newt asks. "Was it a kaiju attack, or--?"

But this is one of those times when he really, really should have remembered when to shut up. Hermann storms out (fast--he's hurting himself) and doesn't come back all day.

Newt wishes he could drift with Hermann, just so he could understand how he works and not fuck up so much, but he's pretty sure they don't let people like him pilot jaegers. Besides, then Hermann would know all the things Newt hasn't told anybody.

But at least they wouldn't hurt each other's feelings as much.

*

They hurt each other's feelings, but there are days when they don't. The jabs are less sharp and unkind, although Newt suspects that anyone watching can't tell the difference.

There isn't any awkward one-sided crush phase. You'd probably think Newt would be the one to have that, but nope. They're perfectly in sync with the weird little dance of how they relate to one another. They're the same kind of freak and Newt doesn't ask about Hermann's leg anymore and no one else can check Hermann's math and no one else truly thinks Newt is as smart as he claims.

And yes, they're probably going to die soon. Newt has watched Hermann work a dozen times and seen the numbers reflect on his glasses and the utter hopeless certainty in his eyes. They're going to die. It's just a matter of when, and with Hermann's predictive abilities, there's not a very wide margin for even that.

As the program expands, they shift quarters. Their lab space is tiny. Their living space is tiny. They've given quarters adjacent to the lab, but neither of them manages to stay there more than a night. Hermann claims it isn't set up right and won't elaborate, and Newt can't sleep with the wrong amount of light coming through the window.

He ends up dragging the cot-like bed into the corner of the lab and putting up a makeshift curtain. Eventually, Hermann comes out of his room to see what all the banging is about.

"What are you _doing?_ he demands.

"This is better," Newt says. "Trust me."

Hermann doesn't look like he thinks trusting Newt is a good idea, but he comes over to the bed. "Newton, what--"

"C'mere." Newt crawls into the bed, smooshes himself up against the wall, and opens his arms.

Hermann stares at him. "That doesn't look like a good night's sleep."

"Try?" Newt says. "If you're stiff tomorrow you can--I don't know, punch me or something. One free punch. Dude, c'mon, please." He's up today, way up, and he doesn't like the idea of sleeping alone any more than Hermann likes his shitty room.

Hermann looks like he's going to say something, but Newt doesn't have any idea what. Then he just sputters and says instead, " _Fine_. I'll succumb to your--your _weird_ ideas for tonight."

Neither of them gets much sleep that night. The cot is small, and Newt spends the whole night pressed up against the wall so Hermann won't _freak out_ when Newt accidentally touches him. He knows Hermann is asleep between midnight and one o'clock because that's the only time he relaxes and takes up more than about three inches of bed.

It's still better than sleeping alone.

The next night, they don't even discuss it. They just fall into bed together. It's been an especially long day--there was a kaiju attack--and they're both completely exhausted. Newt starts to say, "Hey, but, do you--" but he stops himself. That night, they actually sleep.

Just as they discovered how well they work together in terms of weird eating schedules, weird communication, etc., the sleeping arrangement works for them.

Newt's lost track of how long they've been sharing a bed--maybe a month and a half, maybe two?--when things change. He wakes up around three in the morning to find himself pressed up against Hermann's back, arms around his waist. And Hermann hasn't hit him yet.

"Hey," Newt says quietly, just to make sure.

"Mm," Hermann says, but not like he's asleep. Just like he's thinking.

"Okay," Newt mutters. "Okay." He tugs Hermann a little closer, then waits for Hermann to slowly and carefully roll over to face him.

Newt is about to say something, more things, many things, but Hermann presses his forehead against Newt's and huffs out a breath.

"I could use some _silence_ ," he whispers, his voice crisp and harsh.

"Me too, dude," Newt sighs. But he holds on, in case that helps. "Should we--like, should we have sex? Probably, right? Just to try it?" He's pretty sure sex is terrifying, and that he's really bad at it, but this connection--they can't ignore it, right?

"Hm," Hermann says. His eyes are shut. "Yes, all right."

"All right, or yes?" Newt asks. He _knows_ Hermann. He needs a straight answer if Hermann wants to do something in the face of all prior evidence.

"Yes," Hermann says. "Yes, I want to try. But I might stop you."

"I might freak out," Newt says cheerfully. "So, fair." He slides his hand under Hermann's shirt as a good start.

After a few minutes of clumsy kissing and touching in the dark, with a lot of cursing and repositioning from Hermann, he mutters, "Tell me you've done this before."

"Did I hurt your leg?" Newt asks.

"Not _you_ ," Hermann says. "It's just--difficult. We'll work around it. Just let me tell you where to be."

Which is _oh man so hot_. "Okay!" Newt says. He lowers his voice. "Don't worry, we'll figure this sex thing out together."

Hermann stops and gives him a look. " _I_ have done this before."

"Oh wow I want to die," Newt says. "But you--hey! You don't even like people touching you!"

"I'm married," Hermann says after a fractional pause. "But if it doesn't bother you, it doesn't bother her."

Newt stares. "You're not _married_ ," he says scornfully.

"I assure you, I am," Hermann spits. His hands are still on Newt. "Her name's Vanessa. She's a model."

Newt laughs and Hermann hits him, pretty hard, given their awkward position.

"Ow!" Newt says. "Jesus, fuck, okay! Okay, so she's a model."

"Whatever you're thinking, it's inaccurate," Hermann says. "Do you still want this?"

"Uh, _yeah_ ," Newt says. He can't believe he never _knew_.

"Just pay attention," Hermann says, sounding like a schoolteacher, "and I'll tell you where to put your tongue."

Afterwards, Hermann rolls away from Newt, with a muttered apology. "Good," he says. He sounds breathless. "Good, but I still don't like--Prolonged physical contact makes me anxious."

"You don't need to tell me, idiot," Newt says. His voice comes out all slurred and stupid.

They lie together in the dark, side by side in the small bed.

"Hey," Newt whispers, half laughing, "do you think we'll make it?" It's a joke. A shitty joke. They both know no one's going to make it.

"Numbers don't lie." Hermann's voice is brittle.

Newt touches Hermann's hip gently and decides maybe this is the time he will ask. "What happened?"

"Happened?" Hermann asks icily.

Newt shuts up.

"It wasn't a kaiju," Hermann says. "Beyond that, I don't wish to discuss it. Stop asking."

They don't sleep much, but it's not a bad night, as nights go these days.

*

Newt is like ninety percent (whatever, numbers are Hermann's thing) sure that everyone on base hates them. Probably because they're manifestly not soldiers and they're awkward and manic and literally crazy? 

Tendo Choi has totally got their backs, though.

One day when Newt's taking scrapings from a piece of kaiju flesh, he hears Pentecost and Tendo talking about him.

"He's gonna drive me to distraction," Pentecost says. He's behind Newt, looking through some of Newt's data, but Newt is pretty sure he's rubbing his temples.

"It's good stuff, though," Tendo says. Newt wishes Hermann were around to hear that.

"I can hear you," Newt says distractedly. "And it's _great_ stuff. I swear, dream job, right here. Kaiju guts."

Pentecost sighs. "No wonder you don't have a girlfriend."

Tendo laughs incredulously. "You're kidding, right? He and Gottlieb are a thing."

Pentecost doesn't say anything.

"Did you not know that?" Tendo sounds incredulous. "I know you're busy, but come on. Sir."

"I did not know that," Pentecost says. He doesn't get surprised often.

Newt feels both smug and totally embarrassed. They are a thing. A thing. Something.

*

The move to Hong Kong and the rapid dissolution of the program takes a toll on everyone. The rest of the science team falls away almost immediately when the funding does, but they look at each other, catch each other's eyes, and don't go anywhere. Their living quarters are even more cramped and obviously the bed goes in a corner of the lab. They're still having sex (on the nights Hermann wants to be touched and Newt ca slow himself down enough) and they're still alive.

But because the world is ending, or because they're people who hate each other, they have bad days. 

There are things Newt would never share with Hermann, because he knows Hermann would judge him to the point of walking away, like about the year he was homeless, or about how he's bought kaiju parts just for souvenirs, or exactly the nature and extent of his feelings for Hermann.

He knows there are things Hermann won't share with him, either. He's even figured some of them out. Hermann thinks Newt is going to get sick, because of his work, and because he's not careful. Newt is also pretty sure Hermann has compared him to the kaiju worshippers, at least in his head. There are other things he can't guess, like why Hermann needs a cane and--honestly, most of Hermann's personal life is a blank. And that's okay, because these are weird times with weird rules, but it still freaks Newt out.

Newt can see Hermann _not_ watching him when Pentecost and the rangers talk about the drift. Just to piss him off, one day Newt says, "Hey, can you even imagine what it feels like to have that kind of connection?"

Hermann goes white (with fury or fear?) and snaps, "No, I don't suppose I can."

Newt hadn't meant it as a personal insult. He'd been trying to flirt, kind of. Not quite right. Maybe he can't imagine that kind of connection either. Because for every day they think in tandem, there's a day like this. Hermann says too many things that are actually hurtful and doesn't seem able to tell the difference. Newt says something he _means_ as a joke and gets run over for it. This isn't drifting; it isn't even being _friends_.

Sometimes Newt thinks the impending apocalypse is the only glue holding them together. They're going to die soon, and they need _something_ , so why not this?

Except Hermann apparently _does_ I have other stuff.

Newt dreams about monsters. He dreams he's walking the streets of Hong Kong, and it's so stiflingly hot he can't breathe, and something is coming. The streets are full of ooze and heat, and somewhere a bell is ringing.

_Hermann_ , he says, but Hermann doesn't answer. He's standing with his back to Newt, holding hands with a woman.

Newt doesn't want them to turn around.

Because--what? Monsters? They'll turn around and look like--or, no, they'll turn around a kaiju will burst through the pavement--no, they'll turn around and just like that Newt will be alone. 

He dreams about being a kid, maybe thirteen, and looking out the window up the street into the setting sun. He's barefoot, friendless, and he can't breathe past the wall of emotions in his chest.

The kaiju smashes through the wall of his house, but he's not afraid, because he knows that's not how it happened. It was later than that, he was older--

He dreams that everything is horrible and he's going to die. He's alone in the rain facedown on the pavement and covered in kaiju blood, his blood, they are the same thing. Someone is trying to take him apart and study him.

They're sitting in a restaurant in Hong Kong because Newt has bullied Hermann into it and they're having an argument. Same argument, different topic, come on hermann try the squid try _something_ , you know i don't eat squid, they don't look _that_ much like kaiju, you know that's not what i meant _newton_ , and that's it okay today herman doesn't love him.

He wakes up screaming into the pillow, which is fucking embarrassing. He can't remember how to breathe for a few seconds.

Hermann startles awake. "Newton?"

"Hermann," Newt says, because Hermann doesn't give a shit if Newt uses his first name in private. "When we save the world, what happens to me?"

"What?" Hermann asks. His hands are all over Newt, soothing and steady. Hermann is _never_ steady.

Newt shakes his head and blinks blood that isn't there out of his eyes. "We save the world and you--What, go back to England or Germany or wherever with your wife and ten babies and I--I--Shit, I'm an idiot."

Hermann is silent. Newt thinks he probably just ruined everything. Maybe their thing was more of an unspoken thing? Fuck, fuck, fuck. Why can't he ever read people? Even Hermann is too normal for him.

Newt finishes thinking all that bullshit and Hermann says, "Just one baby." 

" _God_ ," Newt says. His voice comes out all squeaky.

"Stop it," Hermann says sharply. "I know what you're thinking. That I'm, I'm some sort of--"

"Normal person," Newt says. "What the hell is happening?"

"Nothing _new_." Hermann hauls himself upright. "I--met Vanessa at a _group_. A disability group."

Newt has never heard Hermann use that word about himself before. 

"She's that kind of model," Hermann says. He won't look at Newt. "Artificial limbs. We met three years ago."

"Wait," Newt says.

Hermann still won't look at him.

"I've known you for five years," Newt says.

"Mm," Hermann says.

"So--what?" Newt demands. "What does that mean? We started our--thing more than three years ago. I mean, not the sex thing, but the--thing. Where we had a thing. Right? Unless I imagined that thing, which would be embarrassing."

"You didn't," Hermann says. "I'm trying to tell you. Pentecost _forced_ me to attend this _group_ , and I met Vanessa there. I made it quite clear when she expressed an interest that I--that we--That there was someone, a colleague, with whom I had something of an understanding. An undefined understanding. A connection."

"And she said, 'Okay, Hermann, that's cool, let's get married and have a baby?" That's not Newt's real question. He's getting to that.

"Essentially," Hermann said. "Newton, there are a number of things people can be to one another. I would have thought you'd known."

"Why would you have a _baby_ if you think the world is ending?" Newt demands. Still not the point.

" _She_ doesn't think it's ending," Hermann says. Scornful, but in a different way than he is with Newt. "It was her decision, of course. There are a lot of choices in _her_ life that don't involve _me_ >"

"Okay," Newt says carefully. "So let me get this straight. You knew we have a _connection_ , but you still went and married this woman and didn't tell me about it?"

Hermann recoils, and Newt thinks for a second that he's going to fall out of bed. "I didn't know! I'm--bad with people, it's what you always say. I literally cannot read them or what they want from me, emotionally speaking. You know this. And I couldn't _ask_. What would I say? Would I demand to know what your feelings for me were? I wasn't even sure you liked men!"

"We _suck_ ," Newt says. "Oh my god. We really suck. We should be banned from humanity. Except for your wife, I guess."

"I told you about her before we slept together," Hermann says.

Newt chews on the whole business for a minute. "If we live," he says, "can I meet her?"

Hermann clears his throat. "Yes. Yes, I suppose."

_You don't think we'll live,_ , Newt thinks. _I'll show you._

He settles back down and waits until Hermann does the same. Then he says, "So I'm not nuts, then. We really do have a connection."

Hermann nods in the dark.

"This is what they mean," Newt says, "when they say 'drift compatible.'"

"I know, idiot," Hermann snarls.

Newt knows, these days, that he's going to die. Hermann could probably even tell him the date and time. But he doesn't think he's going to be alone when he does it.


End file.
